[QUOTE=Aspenglow]
It’s not just Hillary Clinton. It’s Nancy Pelosi. It’s Kamala Harris. It’s Maxine Waters. It’s Elizabeth Warren. It’s Diane Feinstein. I could go on.
[/QUOTE]
Who is keeping them down? IIRC, Kamala Harris has been under attack by Sanders and Warren et al and the progressives, not because she is a woman but because she isn’t progressive and is establishment (I could be thinking of someone else here). Warren and Feinstein aren’t attacked because they are women, but because of their progressive views by those who don’t’ agree with those views. I’m not seeing anyone in your example as someone being put down or kept down because they are women, but instead, women who are being attacked because of their political stances by people who don’t agree with those stances.
WWII Fighter Pilot (WWII veteran)
US House of Representatives
Ambassador to the UN
Chairman of the GOP National Committee
Envoy to PRC (basically ambassador, but we didn’t have official relations with PRC at the time)
Director, CIA
Vice President, 2 terms
I don’t see how anyone could say that HRC has more qualifications than that.
In addition, it’s hard to see how being First Lady is comparable to being Vice President. While VP is pretty undefined except wrt the succession it’s still a political position that does entail quite a lot experience with Washington politics as part of its job, not just as a secondary or tertiary benefit to simply being married to the president.
ETA: And for the record, I voted for Hillary and thought she was the best candidate.
Hillary was plenty qualified (beyond the official qualifications listed in the US Constitution). She would have made a perfectly good president. No need to claim she was “the single most qualified candidate ever to run for President”.
What else did he bring to the table, in terms of political experience? Did you see tons of mocking for the appearances or temperaments of Marco Rubio? John Kasich? Rand Paul? No. They were all granted the threshold gravitas to run for the office, in a way that Hillary Clinton was not.
These were all people who claim to be pretty dialed in politically and my conversational experiences with them bore that out. So just not true.
When Bill Clinton was running for Prez, I read a few profiles of Hillary and thought, “Man, she’s the one who should be running.” There was a certain amount of commentary to the effect that perhaps he wouldn’t be president if he wasn’t married to her. She seemed perfect, but she did not have his charisma, which is apparently an important factor. He’s got it, she doesn’t (apparently; I have met him, and he sure does. I have never met her.)
But what gets me is, if a woman runs for the office apparently she has to be absolutely perfect in every way. This obviously does not apply to any of the men.
Obviously anybody running will be mocked for anything–pantsuits, hairstyle, carrying dogs on the roof of their car. And there is always something. And obviously you can successfully run for president without any charisma at all (Nixon, you-know-who).
But I think a successful female candidate will have to have an amazing personality, fashion sense, uncontroversial hairstyle, along with everything else required to make the run (lots of connections, money, track record).
There are certainly many of those. I’m not talking about them. It’s perfectly normal to have disagreements with politicians on the merits of their positions. I didn’t agree with Obama or H. Clinton on some of their stances, either. But I’m capable of discerning a qualified candidate from an unqualified one – and a significant number of Americans aren’t, it would seem.
As for people who are being put down or kept down because they are women, I think you might want to keep an eye on the things that are said about Elizabeth Warren, particularly. She is frequently described as “shrill, hysterical, unhinged, know-it-all.” Those are not legitimate criticisms and are generally reserved for female candidates.
I asked people like you. They did not have responses at the ready. It really was an eye-opening experience. Try it yourself, among your learned peers. I think you may be surprised.
I think Warren IS a ‘shrill, hysterical unhinged, know-it all’ from a certain political view point, and has nothing to do with her sex. I think similar things about Trump, and he presumably has a dick (not that I want that mental picture).
I don’t think America or the American voters are opposed to women in office, or a woman for president. I don’t think that only a white male can defeat the orange one either. I think it’s all about the right candidate, regardless of sex or race. The big issue I see is that Dems, especially those on the left think that their progressive mantra is the be all and end all and that they are being held back because of white racist (or the evil Democratic Establishment(tm…arr)), while I think it’s because their politics are just not all that appealing to most voters, even if they have an old white guy sing them. Trump is definitely beatable and should be beaten…if the Dems can stop beating themselves up in these stupid internal wars for control. Sadly, I think the lesson many Dems ‘learned’ in the last election is that radical fringe politics can win elections…since the Donald won, that means the progressive and left wing should win as well.
I don’t understand. Are you saying it is acceptable to mock candidates for their appearance if they don’t have significant “political experience”, but it’s not acceptable if they do?
I wouldn’t claim that there was “tons of mocking” for anyone, but it certainly happened. Did you forget about ‘Little Marco’? ‘Low energy’ Jeb? ‘Crazy Bernie’? It’s America. Our public figures get mocked. If not by each other then certainly by the citizenry. It’s not something we only do to females.
I don’t know what this means. “granted the threshold gravitas to run for the office”? Are you saying that people / media / fellow candidates didn’t take her run seriously? Because that seems … wrong.
There’s a better chance of the first woman president being a Republican than a Democrat. For all the talk about how the GOP is “sexist,” the Republicans typically support their Joni Ernsts, Sarah Palins, etc. with just as much fervor as their male counterparts. If a woman appeared to be the front-leading contender for the presidential candidacy , she would sail through the GOP nomination pretty easily.
And in all this time, it’s never been a woman who was “the right candidate” to be in either of the top two positions in our country. I do think you need to consider the role that misogyny has played in that. Your own example about Donald Trump winning, despite being the most unqualified, provable liar in the history of American politics, demonstrates that better than anything else.
Please notice that there are people in this thread who are attacking me solely on the basis of the quality of my friends, rather than advancing a thoughtful debate as a rebuttal. In Great Debates, no less.
Nope, not saying that. Saying that he was so ill-qualified for the job against someone who was, that the explanation for his election bears scrutiny with respect to the role misogyny played in this last election.
As I recall, there was only one candidate doing that. And rather than excoriate him for it, the Republican Party elected him instead.
If it seems… wrong, it should be easy for you to demonstrate that it’s not the case. I’ll look forward to your cites.
I agree. I think it applies to Dems too though. Look at Aspenglow’s post: “Nikki Haley. God, what an idiot.” There’s not much happiness there for a woman that might one day be president.
Or ask some Dems how the feel about Clarence Thomas. Generally their focus is decidedly not on how great it is that he’s overcome so much racism to rise to a post on the highest court in the land or celebrating the achievements of a black man.
No one is attacking you on the basis of your friends. You introduced the quality of your friends as proof of the OP’s thesis. Surely we are not required to accept said quality as proof of the thesis.
I think you’re placing women’s odds further than they are. Hillary led Trump throughout the election, won the popular vote by 2%, was only 200,000 votes in the Rust Belt away from the presidency, and was weighed down by Obama’s two terms (hard for a party to win three consecutive terms in the White House.)
In fact, I’d bet big money on a woman being president no later than the 2028 election. only question will be if it’s a red or blue woman.